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Banality
Television, doctors, lines at the bank, money machines, traffic, malls – all of these things carry the taint of Banality and negatively affect changelings. Anything that removes the wonder from the eyes of a child, anything that teaches us not to believe in magic or faeries is a source of Banality in the world and is a bane to changelings. The effect of Banality upon a character is measured by her permanent Banality rating. It describes to what extent the mundane world has tainted the character's ability to dream and find wonder in the things around him. Effects of Banality *If your character's Banality score ever exceeds his permanent Glamour score, he begins to slip into the Mists, reverting to his mortal seeming and forgetting that he is Kithain. *Banality hangs over mortals and supernatural beings like a shield of disbelief. In order to use Glamour on someone or something, the character must fight against the target's Banality. Most humans have Banality ratings of 7 or higher. *In order to enchant someone, a changeling must first overcome the target's Banality. The difficulty number for enchantment must be equal to or greater than the target's banality rating, at the Storyteller's discretion. *When a character attempts to affect a target with a cantrip, the target's Banality will affect the chance of success. The difficulty number for cantrips should reflect the target's Banality. *Beings that have a Banality rating of 8 or higher actually physically affect changelings. Changelings may become nauseous, experience headaches or just get very edgy and belligerent. This occurs especially if a changeling spends a great deal of time in the company of high Banality people, and gets progressively worse the longer the changeling stays. As a general rule, normal mortals and others with ratings of 7 or lower do not have this effect. Gaining Banality Whenever a changeling engages in a banal act, they gain a Nightmare Die, as their banality manifests and slowly grows to become a part of themselves. To find out if doing something is worth a Nightmare Die, you simply need to consult this list and compare to your personal, permanent banality score. Any act listed on this page will garner your character a point of temporary banality if it is listed above your current banality score. This means that if your changeling is banality 6, he does not get a nightmare die for engaging in anything listed under 5 or 6, but he WILL get a nightmare die for engaging in anything listed under 7, 8, 9 or 10. Note that if your character’s banality is 4 or less, anything listed on this chart will net you a nightmare die. These are examples and guidelines of what will gain you a Nightmare Die, but the list is not to be considered complete. Players are expected to police themselves in matters of banality, but ST calls will still be made as well. Note: Killing someone with cold iron is always worth a permanent banality. 'Banality 5' *Staunch denial of the possibility of a conspiracy theory. (“The Shadow Court doesn’t exist.”) *Active lack of faith in anything-is-possible. (“I can’t make this jump. It’s too far!”) 'Banality 6 ' *Failing to find the wonder in something Glamourous. (“Oh look, another dragon.”) *Prioritizing the Autumn World over the Chimerical. (“We can’t play swords in public. Someone will see us!”) 'Banality 7 ' *Passing up adventure and obsession for responsibility or day-to-day concerns. (“If I miss another day at work, I’ll be fired.”, “I have finals that week.”) *Focusing intensely on details and minutiae -- obsessing over the tree, instead of seeing the forest, “small picturing.” 'Banality 8 ' *Opting to value minutiae over the greater beauty of something (being a spoil-sport over a small detail). *Being an emotional/creative drain on others by playing Eeyore. 'Banality 9' *Insisting and imposing your minutiae, boring, banal reality over someone else’s reality. *Actively unmaking the glamorous dreams of another, actively forcing Banality 7 or 8 acts on another. 'Banality 10 ' *Actively denying the existence of the Chimerical (a troll stuffing himself into a small car, a pooka ignoring his ears and tail, etc). *Botching a cantrip roll. *Using Banality to counter a cantrip. *Failing a roll to enchant another. *Destroying a Treasure. *Killing certain chimera. *Killing someone mortally. *Killing someone chimerically. *Chimerically dying. *Failing or botching a Ravaging roll. *Breaking a formal Oath (in addition to the Oath’s rules.) Getting Rid of Banality *Any time a character is supposed to gain a temporary point of Banality, he must add a Nightmare die to his Nightmare pool instead. *A point of permanent Glamour may be sacrificed to remove a point of permanent Banality. Keep in mind there are limitations to how quickly a point of permanent Glamour can be recovered. This option can only be taken with Storyteller approval, and under specific circumstances. Permanent Banality cannot drop lower than a character's base Seeming rating without Storyteller approval. *With the Storyteller's approval, your character may undertake a quest that will effectively reduce his permanent Banality. These quests usually involve an Oath, which will bind the changeling to the task and punish him for an unsuccessful completion. Once decided upon, the quest must be completed successfully, or the character gains a point of permanent Banality rather than losing one. Any one of three types of quests will serve this purpose, but the details of the quest must be approved by the Storyteller: **''The Quest of Deed:'' The Kithain must swear to undertake some task, such as recovering something lost or rescuing someone. **''The Quest of Inspiration:'' An individual is chosen and the changeling must spend the next several months or years (however long it takes) to bring that person to greatness. The Kithain may not interfere directly in any way; she may only inspire. **''The Quest of Dreaming:'' A changeling may attempt to bring the Dreaming into a mortal's life. An individual is chosen, generally one firmly entrenched in his own Banality. The Kithain must then bring the mortal back to living with a sense of joy, awe and wonder about the world around him, much like the angel did in “It's a Wonderful Life.” This process could take years or a single night, as in “A Christmas Carol,” depending on the cleverness of the changeling. However, once a changeling has brought a mortal around, that mortal becomes his responsibility, and if ever the mortal should fall back into the clutches of Banality, the changeling has a duty to re-establish the miracle. Nightmare Dice With the nature of online play, tracking temporary Banality is a bit of micromanaging that I am not really up to. I'm asking players instead to police themselves. To represent the impact that Banality has on Kithain characters, I'm implimenting the Nightmare dice system. Any time a character is about to suffer a point (or more) of temporary Banality, the player must acquire a Nightmare die instead. The number of Nightmare dice that a character currently possesses should be recorded in the character's tags. The total number of dice is referred to as the Nightmare Pool. If a character ever gains more than 10 Nightmare dice, they are removed immediately and the character gains a point of permanent Banality. Whenever a character with Nightmare dice casts a cantrip, the dice in the Nightmare Pool must be substituted for an equal number of dice in the player's Dice Pool. These dice should never exceed the total Dice Pool, even if the character possesses more Nightmare dice than are rolled to perform a cantrip. For example, if a character has a pool of eight dice to cast a cantrip, and has a Nightmare Pool of three, three dice from the Dice Pool would be substituted by three Nightmare dice. Any time a "one" is rolled on a Nightmare die, the character suffers the ill effects of a Nightmare. The number of Nightmare dice that come up as "ones" determines the severity of the Nightmare experienced. Once a Nightmare die rolls a "one," it is removed from the character's Nightmare Pool. Once Nightmare dice have been assigned to the pool, there is no way for them to be removed short of rolling "ones" and imposing Nightmares. Descriptions of possible Nightmares are found on the chart below. In cases of multiple possible Nightmares (IE choosing a single level 3 Nightmare) roll 1d4 to pick from the list. What do the Numbers Mean? 'Banality: 5' For human adults, this is borderline insanity. Mortals in this frame of mind may have invisible friends, believe in conspiracy theories, live in elaborate delusions, or fall prey to rampant paranoia and take precautions against secret societies living in their midst. Getting a job as an occult investigator for a tabloid newspaper or selling bottles of holy water downtown in your off-hours are two good career moves. Be careful, though, or you'll wind up in an asylum. Briefly seeing (and misunderstanding) elements of the Dreaming is a faint possibility. For human children, this is borderline maturity. You can still grow up to be the President of the United States, become an astronaut or go to Harvard someday. Being nine years old isn't really that bad, except when you have to go to school. Among the Kithain, this is the Banality of an extremely open-minded grump. Most grumps don't keep this state of grace for long. Although this frame of mind is extremely dull by faerie standards, the individual nonetheless believes himself to be the reincarnation of a being from a magical race that regularly interacts with a dimension of imaginary people and objects. He will not, however, play “Ring Around the Rosie” without at least some prompting. 'Banality: 6' In human society, this is the state of mind of a creative artist. She is poised between the mundane concerns of day-to-day life and the maddening call of her muse. Maintaining this frame of mind can be difficult. Under the right conditions, an artist can create beautiful works of art and find truthful revelations. Seeing chimerical objects, however, is out of the question without enchantment. For a changeling who is slowly going mundane, there is still hope at this stage. The changeling may feel the need to spend more time around mundanes at this level of Banality. She might hang out a lot at an art school, beg for change on the streets, follow a band or medieval recreation group across the country, or just generally spend a great deal of time with Glamorous mortals trying to induce Reverie. If she doesn't act quickly, she may find her task slowly becoming more difficult. 'Banality: 7' This is the state of mind of the average mortal: practical, sensible, and cautious. This type of person keeps plenty of food in the fridge, cleans his apartment once a week, and rarely stays up past midnight. For more inspiration on this kind of behavior, watch an evening of prime time television or spend an afternoon doing housework. A changeling at this level of Banality finds the concerns of the mundane world more pressing than the needs of the Dreaming. Any call to adventure requires him first to make cautious plans and question how it will affect his mundane life. Any adventurous course of action seems somewhat foolish at first. Unseelie are better able to resist Banality than Seelie. One welcome distraction is the diversion of the Shadow Court. Members of the Court at this level become more concerned with the trivial details than with the problems outside of their social circle. They are muckrakers who traffic in gossip and try to deny their own Banality by rooting out despair and failure in those around them. They also become powerful Ravagers, but they play a dangerous game, risking their hearts and souls for the sake of raw power. 'Banality: 8' This is the frame of mind of a Heavy Sleeper or a weak Autumn Person. Truly banal people resist despair and mistrust by becoming obsessive and anal. Anyone who does not share these traits is a threat to them. Seelie handle this sickening of the spirit someone differently. Tearing oneself away from regret and despair is difficult, although the changeling is painfully aware of what is happening to her. Finding the energy to go out and truly live becomes difficult. It's so much safer to just stay at home. She still trusts the guidance of her friends, but she requires their leadership to help her clear the cobwebs from her mind. Unseelie find other diversions as their hearts harden. At this stage, mundane Unseelie either elevate themselves to higher positions in the Shadow Court and increase their addiction, or tear themselves away from it completely. Rogues who isolate themselves from the Court (or are rejected from it) begin to spiral into epic fests of Ravaging in a desperate attempt to either stave off spiritual decay or lessen the pain by inducing Bedlam. The difficulty for any roll involving an Epiphany is increased by one for characters who have achieved this level of Banality. 'Banality: 9' This is the mental state of an Autumn Person. Faeries find that prolonged exposure to this type of individual can actually be physically painful. For more ideas on how to be truly banal, ride across the country in a bus for three days while making 10 minute stops in small towns along the way. (Legal considerations prevent us from naming a suitable bus line for this enterprise, but the reader should be able to find one.) A changeling at this level of Banality begins to forget the more Glamourous details of her past. As her temporary Banality continues to increase, more and more memories of her faerie life disappear. The fae forgets the name of kith allies and the locations of freeholds. Her fae mien resembles her mundane seeming almost exactly. Understanding or even seeing elements of the Dreaming is difficult (+2 difficulty to all Kenning, Gremayre and Remembrance rolls). 'Banality: 10' Humans at this state of Banality lose their emotions. They are oblivious to the joys of life and gain an inscrutable affinity to tedious things. Childhood has been forgotten, love is an impossibility, and only the stupor of intoxication can offer a temporary surcease from the depths of sorrow. A changeling who gains 10 points of Permanent Banality is in severe risk of being Undone. 'Average Banality Ratings' The following are the suggested banality ratings for characters played in Dusk. Most characters will follow these guidelines, though there are special circumstances in a crossover game such as this. Any of the following that also happen to be Kinain most likely have a lower banality than listed below. If you feel your character's banality should be different than listed, get with me with a reason why. Otherwise, the numbers below will be used. Kinain characters and those with the merit Faerie Affinity, typically have lower banality than their counterparts, by a point or two. However, currently, I am not allowing any non-Changeling character type, Kinain or otherwise, outside of Marauders, to have a permanent banality lower than 3. *''' - Mystics include the Verbena, Cult of Ecstasy, Hermetics, and Dreamspeakers. True Believers are the Celestial Chorus, Akashic Brotherhood, Euthanatos, Sorcerers. The Modern Cynics are the Sons of Ether, Hollow Ones, Virtual Adeps, many Orphans, and Psychics. '''** - These numbers reflect the majority. They represent a well-adjusted, rational person. The age guidelines refer to the expected mindset and norm. "Immature" characters, or those that get lost in artistic pursuits or conspiracy theories may be 1 banality lower. While those tending towards the ways of the Autumn Person may be 1 greater. *** - Ragabashes, Theurges, and Galliards may be 1 banality lower than their Philodox and Ahroun counterparts. Excessive Wyrm-taint itself is banal, but a heavy Weaver influence is far more threatening to the Fae, and should be assigned banality accordingly. **** - Vampires are static creatures that do not dream. They do not sleep during the daylight hours, they die. Because of this, they do not receive many banality breaks. Vampires of great age may even be more banal than listed. Category:Changeling Category:House Rules